


The Thirst for Glorious Souls

by shimotsuki



Category: Chalion Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:14:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24948241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shimotsuki/pseuds/shimotsuki
Summary: Cazaril tries to convince a surly stranger that enough endurance is enough.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 20





	The Thirst for Glorious Souls

_Cazaril!_

The summons jerked him from a sound sleep. He was out of bed and on his feet even before he was fully awake.

But it was not Betriz who had called; she slept on, undisturbed, curled on her side beneath the embroidered coverlet. And Iselle had sent no messenger to rouse him, for the bedchamber was dark and still.

He blinked, stupidly, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. Who had called him?

_Cazaril!_

He gasped as his mind was filled by a vast and fragrant blue Presence.

No—not a messenger from Iselle. Not at all.

“Am I dying, Lady?” he whispered, frozen where he stood.

 _No, not today,_ said the Daughter. _But you are needed. Will you come?_

“I cannot refuse You.”

 _Yes, you can,_ the Voice replied. _But I am grateful that you do not choose to do so. Come along, then._

There was a great whirl of color and light, and Cazaril found himself in a very grim place indeed. Dry reddish dirt and brown rocks stretched to the horizon. The sky that loomed overhead was grey and cold. Two dozen paces ahead of him, someone sat, motionless, with his head in his hands. Cazaril rather thought that spending much time in this place would drive anyone to despair.

“Oh!” came a voice behind him. “Hello! Did the Lady send you?”

He turned to see a young girl, with golden hair and sad blue eyes. She was dressed in unfamiliar clothing, but she looked to be about the age Iselle had been when he had first come to her in Valenda.

“Yes,” he said, “although She didn’t tell me _why_ She was sending me.” He bowed, trying to be as graceful as he could in a nightshirt and with muscles still stiff from sleep. “My name is Cazaril, and I seem to be at your service.”

The girl curtsied prettily in return. “My name is Ariana. Thank you for coming.”

“How—” He gestured helplessly. “How can I serve you?”

“It’s Professor Snape,” said Ariana, looking past Cazaril at the hunched figure ahead of them. “The Son wants to welcome his soul home, but he won’t leave this place. I asked the Lady to help me convince him to go on—and so She sent you.”

Ariana began to walk toward the man—Snape—and Cazaril hurried to catch up.

“What place is this?” he asked. It was nothing like the breathtaking garden of souls that the Daughter had let him see once before. “And why won’t he leave it?”

The girl shook her head sadly. “This place is something from the professor’s own mind. As for why he won’t leave it, I don’t know—he won’t talk to me at all.”

They drew near the sitting figure. Ariana called out to him. “Professor?”

“Go away,” the man snarled, without looking up. “I’ve told you. I’m finished with _students._ ”

The way Snape hissed that last word made Cazaril wonder what kind of teacher he had been.

“I’m not a student,” said Ariana tightly. “ _I’ve_ told _you._ I never went to Hogwarts.” She sighed. “Anyway, there’s someone else here to speak with you now.”

Snape raised his head at that, fixing Cazaril with a baleful stare. “Who are _you?_ ”

“My name is Cazaril,” he said again, this time without the bow. “The Daughter of Spring has sent me here—but I still don't know exactly why.”

The other man turned his head away. “Your gods have nothing to do with me.”

“You belong to the Son,” said Ariana forcefully. “He has said so. But _I_ belong to the Daughter, and I asked Her for help.”

Snape lurched to his feet. “ _Why?_ Why must you insist on bothering me, when all I wish is to be left here in peace?”

Tears glistened on the girl’s lashes. “Albus is waiting for you to move on. He misses you, and he can’t stand to see you suffering alone in this horrid place. And _I_ can’t stand to see _him_ so worried and disappointed.”

“If Dumbledore cares whether I move on from here or not,” snarled Snape, “why hasn’t he come to tell me so himself?”

“My brother feels he cannot ask another thing of you,” said Ariana softly, “ever again.”

Something flickered in Snape’s eyes, but he clenched his jaw and looked away. “It doesn’t matter what Dumbledore wants. My soul is not fit for the company of any god.”

“That’s not so,” Cazaril broke in. He had no idea who either of these people were, but the Lady of Spring had obviously decided he should help Ariana make her case—She, at least, must not wish to abandon Snape to this self-imposed barren isolation.

“What do _you_ know?” Snape spat, wheeling to face him. “I made mistakes. Far too many. I turned my back on a friend. I chose to follow evil, and people died because of it. And then, even when I tried to make recompense, I failed. In the end, I killed the only man I could still call my friend. What god could possibly want to welcome a soul like mine?”

“One thing I do know,” said Cazaril, “is what a very wise woman once told me: that the gods thirst for glorious souls, not faultless ones.”

“Glorious.” Snape’s mouth twisted.

“That’s right,” Ariana whispered. “Albus told me how much you sacrificed, and how much you achieved.”

Snape’s face was very still now, and his eyes darted uncertainly from Ariana to Cazaril and back.

“The Daughter _did_ send me, you know,” said Cazaril. “She wouldn’t have roused me from a sound sleep to come here and argue with you if She didn’t think your soul was fit for Her company.”

And then, all at once, Someone else was there. _Severus,_ came a voice like the call of a hunting horn. _We are all waiting for you. Come home._

For the first time, there was hope on the pinched, sallow face.

“Go on,” said Cazaril gently.

After that, things happened too quickly for him to sort out. He would remember a blaze of color a hundred times brighter than sunlight through autumn leaves, and blue eyes that suddenly smiled. And then he was back in the quiet darkness of his bedchamber with his bare feet turning cold on the stones of the floor.

He slipped into bed, shivering. Betriz muttered something and curled up against him, warming his chilled limbs.

As Cazaril drifted back to sleep, there was the tiniest hint of a sweet, sweet fragrance, and the gentlest brush of a Voice against his mind: _Thank you._

— _fin_ —

**Author's Note:**

> This crossover was a little out-of-the-ordinary for me, and it is certainly something separate from my overall HP ficverse (which consists of (at least?) the series Light the Corners of my Mind, Kaleidoscope, Under the Long Shadow, and Warp and Weft, not all of which have begun going up at AO3 yet).
> 
> I wrote this fic as a very late (and therefore unofficial) response to a prompt from the Summer 2009 Bujold Fest; the prompt was 'Cazaril and Severus Snape (Harry Potter); _endurance_.' It was originally posted at **bujold_fic** on LiveJournal in October 2009.
> 
> Someday I do hope to write a Snape-in-the-HP-afterlife fic, probably for Under the Long Shadow.


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